Shadowless World

Did Sonic Drown?

Boom Sonic sinks in the water, passing out, wondering...

"What happened? Am I drowning? Wow, this sucks. Not even sure how I ended up in, what is this, the ocean? This is surprisingly painless. Ugh..."

Shadow grabs him. Sonic wakes up above the water, in Shadow's arms. He coughs, confused.

"Shadow? Thanks bro, for saving me." Cough, cough. "What the heck happened? How'd I get in the water in the first..." Cough. "...place?"

"No more talking, Sonic," Shadow insists.

Sonic looks down at Shadow's shoes, in the water below. He realizes Shadow is standing in the waves, carrying him. A blue blur darts across a super bridge in the distance. Sonic squints, trying to observe what appears to be another version of him. Everything goes blurry.

Shadow Chaos Controls. Sonic opens his eyes and finds himself in a pretty spiffy-looking, very modern... apartment? Sonic closes his eyes and feels himself being carefully laid on a cushy couch.

Later, though it's not clear to him how long it's been, he awakes again, under a soft blanket, still in the apartment. The sun is rising and everything seems pretty peaceful, apart from the fact that he still has no idea what's going on.

"Ugh, what a weird dream. Even weirder that I'm still having it. Is this one of those dreams where you have to wake up a few times before you actually wake up in your bed? Or in my case, back in my hammock, in my shack? Hold on, I know what's going on! Food poisoning from Meh Burger. Please let that be it."

He sits up as Shadow sits next to him.

"You're awake."

Sonic holds his forehead, zonked.

"Dude, fill me in. Why are we here in this random apartment? Cool, but random."

Shadow folds his arms.

"You don't remember. That's no surprise. I almost don't want to tell you."

"Why not?" Sonic asks, a little frustrated.

Shadow looks down.

"Let's just say this world isn't much better than that Robotropolis place where we last saw each other."

Sonic perks up at the familiar reference.

"Oh yeah, that. That was a wild adventure we had, getting teleported to that dystopian world with Snively the Psychopath as our sworn enemy. So is this place your world?"

"Unfortunately," Shadow confesses with disgust.

"Doesn't seem that bad. Since you and I are from two different universes, you must already have a Sonic here. Judging from how modern this apartment is, I'm guessing he's a pretty modern version of me."

Shadow takes the blanket from Sonic and wraps him in it, protectively.

"Just some faker. Nothing like you," he says, as though this Sonic is quite dear to him.

"Why you being so protective, huh, Shadow? We've been through this before. We went to that dark universe, I made out with Princess Sally, you hung out with Bunnie Rabbot, and we had kind of a good time getting to know each other so... it's all good, man."

Shadow goes to the glass, balcony door, folds his arms again, then gazes at the skyline.

"They think you're a robot clone of this world's Sonic. They attacked you and dumped you in the ocean. Then all the spectating robots cheered, like it was some sort of victory."

Sonic feels out of the loop.

"What? Who? Who did that?"